For many of us of a certain generation, “the Oregon Trail” evokes dim memories of a primitive and often frustrating computer game where dysentery, starvation, an ill-fated fording of a river, or a medley of other hazards perpetually threatened a premature end to the adventure.
The real journey on the 2,170-mile wagon road running from Independence, Mo. to Oregon City, Ore. was hardly less perilous in the 1830s and 1840s than its video game counterpart. And Peoria is an important footnote in early Oregon history.
Peoria was still a young community when the Rev. Jason Lee arrived on Sept. 30, 1838. The Oregon missionary talked up the bountiful opportunities offered by the Western frontier during a speech at the Main Street Presbyterian Church.
Lee urged the Peorians to head west and stake out American claims before the Oregon Territory was entirely controlled by the British Hudson’s Bay Company, which was then rapidly expanding its presence across the Pacific Northwest.
A young Peoria attorney in the audience heeded Lee’s call. Thomas Jefferson Farnham rounded up sixteen local men who would form the “Peoria Party,” also known as the “Oregon Dragoons.” The expedition started west for Independence on May 1, 1839 after a send-off ceremony at the Peoria County Courthouse Square.
Three more men would join up along the way, bringing the total headcount to 19. The Peoria Party was immediately beset with difficulties. In his essay The Peoria Party, Robert G. Day, Sr. wrote the pioneers had 21 days of rain in their first month of travel alone, making for a soggy and rather miserable trek. By early June, three members of the party had turned back for Peoria rather than soldier on.
The 16 remaining party members soon began butting heads under the difficult conditions. On June 21, Sidney Smith was severely wounded when his own gun mistakenly discharged into his side following an argument.
Tensions only continued to mount after this incident, and on June 27, most of the party “mutinied” against Farnham. Some members of the company wanted to abandon the injured Smith so the remaining men could move more quickly. Farnham and four others refused to leave Smith for dead.
The dispute would ultimately splinter the company apart. Farnham was deposed, and after a tense several days under the nominal leadership of Robert Shortess, the men reached the Bent’s Fork trading post in southeastern Colorado on July 5. There, a vote was held, and Farnham, Smith, and O.A. Oakley were officially expelled from the Peoria Party. Two other men chose to depart with them, and they continued west on their own.
The remaining eight members of the Peoria Party also proceeded for Oregon. But ultimately, just nine of the 19 members of the Peoria Party would actually complete the journey instead of turning back towards home.
Farnham made it to Oregon but soon departed again to send Washington, D.C. a petition from American fur traders asking the U.S. government to wrest control of the region from the British. Farnham would then publish his famous account of the Peoria Party in 1841. Yet Farnham ultimately wouldn’t return to Oregon, instead living in Peoria; Poughkeepsie, N.Y.; and San Francisco before his death in 1848.
Sidney Smith and Robert Shortess, the lead “mutineer,” also made it and left behind written accounts of the journey from Peoria. Each would become prominent Oregon settlers, and both were heavily involved in establishing a provisional government in 1843 to curtail British influence in the territory. A monument at Champoeg State Park in Oregon includes the names of the Peoria Party members who backed this new government.